White Orange: Saturday, Sept. 17

White Orange likes everything to be big and loud.

WHITE ORANGE - IMAGE: Brian Lee

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[HEAVINESS] For most bands, the rehearsal space that White
Orange uses would be more square footage than they could ever need. The
huge room, tucked into the back of a nondescript building in North
Portland’s industrial corridor, boasts 20-foot ceilings and a massive
stage for live-show practice.

White Orange,
however, has filled up almost every inch of it. A large silk-screening
station sits in one corner. In the middle of the room, two trap kits
face each other practically begging for a drum-off. A bong sits
prominently on a cluttered coffee table. The walls are covered with
original art and posters—among them, a framed copy of the band’s first
10-inch record.

“We put that out
before we even had a band,” shaggy-haired singer/guitarist Dustin Hill
says with a raspy laugh. “We just figured, ‘Fuck it. Let’s get these
songs out there.’”

“Fuck
it” pretty well sums up the overriding philosophy of this psych-rock
outfit. Not that White Orange lacks ambition. Hill and his bandmates
(drummer Dean Carroll, bassist Adam Pike and guitarist Ryan McIntire)
love big projects, especially where vinyl is concerned. The band’s last
12-inch was a picture disc decorated with all manner of demons and
religious iconography, and its new self-titled album is housed in a
triple-gatefold cover. The band likes its cover art—an expansive
psychedelic image in orange and blue, reminiscent of the cover to Miles
Davis’ Bitches Brew—so much that it plans to buy the $40,000 Raul Casillas Romo source painting.

Of course, pretty
pictures aren’t the only reason people are starting to pay attention to
White Orange. The new record is a logical step for the worlds of
psychedelic, stoner and heavy rock, pulsating with an inescapable energy
and white-hot intensity. The band doesn’t shy away from its influences,
either. Expansive jams “Dinosaur Bones” and “Color Me Black” feature
clear nods to deified groups such as King Crimson and Pink Floyd—though
Hill is just as quick to note Sonic Youth and Dinosaur Jr. as
influences.

It’s a lot of
backstory for a band with such humble roots. Hill started writing
material for White Orange after failed attempts to create some new music
for one of his other projects, the slinkier, sexier rock outfit Black
Pussy. He pulled in his buddy McIntire to lay down demos (found on the
out-of-print 10-inch) and, inspired by the output, started to build a
full band.

“We didn’t even tell
Dean he was auditioning to be in the group,” McIntire says. “We just
jammed with him for a few weeks to make sure it was the right fit. It’s
gathering the pieces and getting ready for battle.”

Despite that
combative language, what marks the band as a high-functioning collective
is the bond the members obviously share. It’s a friendship born out of
jam sessions and the occasional use of psychedelics, both of which, Hill
says, helped White Orange to “sever from this dimension and not care
and just be honest.

“It’s true with any kind of art,” Hill says. “You just have to do it.”